by Kathleen Clauson, Copyright 2004
Published in Short Attention Span Mysteries, Kerlak Publishing

Renny Spretsma knew someone was dead when his phone started ringing before he had a chance to finish his morning coffee.  He scribbled down, Rockford--Lake Somerset, grabbed his jacket, and bounded downstairs to his car.  Blue sheets of rain gloomed the skies, the streets swollen by inches of rain into a gushing river, captained by empty beer cans.  Renny stopped at the Sinclair station on the corner, where just last year, vandals had cut off the head of the giant green dinosaur that had grazed out front since the 1960s.

"Dammit, Leo," said Renny, snapping a plastic lid on a large coffee.  "No donuts this morning?"

"late delivery," said Leo, biting off the end of a cigar.  "What's wrong--you can't face a dead body with out a donut in hand?"  Renny grinned, wrapped a napkin around his cup, and headed for Rockford, an hour and a half from Chicago.